Keep In Mind
by KleeZeeNex
Summary: Did Raph not have a right to those stages of grief that Donny had mentioned once before? Denial was tough to manage when the constant reminder in his brain wouldn't shut up. Warning: Leo's Dead. If anyone cares.


**Disclaimer: I don't own TMNT.**

**A/N: Involves turtle death, and a whole bunch of crazy. Beta read by Winged Monkey. Thanks for dropping by, and happy reading.**

* * *

The brisk air was the only thing Raph noticed. His movements were automatic; he had gone this route countless times before. He didn't take note of the gritty rooftop under his feet or the once-exhilarating sensation of flight as he leapt from one building to the next. The only thing that interested him at this moment was the cold. The cold made everything else feel real.

"Raph."

Raph skidded to a stop too close to a roof's edge. One crumbly stone loosened underneath his foot and floated to the alley below before Raph regained his balance. Though back on solid ground, Raph's heart raced on.

"Raph." This time the voice was more gentle, almost apologetic.

Raph put his head in his hands and paced back and forth, farther away from the unstable edge.

"Go home, Raph."

This time Raph dropped his hands, giving in like he always did. "I think you gave up the right to tell me what to do when you jumped in front of a bullet," Raph said.

The wind whirled around Raph as he said it. To him, it sounded almost like a sigh. "You're going a little crazy, you know."

Raph whipped around at that, to confront the voice that had origin. "Don't you think I know that?" he snapped. "I got that clue four days ago, when I started to hear my dead brother _in my head_." They had lost him only a week ago, and already Raph had to hear his voice? Did Raph not have a right to those stages of grief that Donny had mentioned once before? Denial was tough to manage when the constant reminder in his brain wouldn't _shut up_.

"I'm sorry."

"Stop saying that!" Raph squeezed his eyes shut. _Go away. Please go away._

"I don't mean to scare you."

"I'm not scared," Raph said through clenched teeth. Was it really any use to lie to a hallucination created by your own mind? Raph doubted it, but the words were out of his mouth before he could think to stop them.

"I didn't mean to leave you, either."

Raph opened his eyes, surprised. This time the voice didn't sound like it was coming in all directions. He could pinpoint the location of the sound as if his brother was right behind him.

He turned.

There Leo was, looking as real as the broken ledge on which he sat. No mist, no transparency... and for one fleeting second Raph was fooled into thinking his brother had never been gone in the first place. But the moment passed, long before Raph would allow himself to take any enjoyment from it. "What are you doing here?" Raph demanded in a quiet voice.

Leo's smile was a sad one. "I don't know."

"Of course you don't."

"I'm sorry."

This time Raph chose not to respond. He was too busy watching his brother, committing this image to memory. The blue bandana tails fluttering in the breeze, the light in Leo's eyes... as opposed to the picture Raph couldn't get out of his head, of Leo's lifeless body covered in blood as Donny tried hopelessly to save him.

For what seemed to be the millionth time that week, Leo's final moments played through Raph's mind.

_"You're it!" Mikey laughed after tackling Donny to the ground._

_Raph made sure to erase any trace of a smile from his face before he said, "Michelangelo, you are sixteen years old. Don't you think you're a little old to be playing tag?" In truth, he was glad. They had all pulled together when Splinter had gotten sick, helped each other cope. Now they were almost fully recovered from Splinter's death, back to being a broken but happy family. _

_Mikey amplified Raph's thoughts by pouting comically. "What about... super secret agent laser ninja tag?"_

_Before Raph could respond, Donny's strangled voice interrupted. "Excuse me...Could we have this conversation after Mikey gets off of me? Room to expand my lungs would be nice."_

_"Sorry, bro." Mikey got to his feet and then gave Donny a hand. "So, where did Leo get to?"_

_"I don't know," Donny said. "I didn't notice that he wasn't following until you mauled me."_

_Raph pushed away from the dumpster he had been leaning against. "Then I guess it's time to play super secret agent find Leo ninja tag," he said._

_The group wasn't searching for long when they heard a commotion coming from a nearby street. Mikey was the first one to stumble on the scene, just in time to see it happen._

_Leo was standing in between two men. One was cowering against a broken street light. The other was raising a gun._

"He was a complete stranger, Leo," Raph said, pacing again. "Why would you do that? Why would you sacrifice yourself for someone you know nothing about?"

Leo leaned forward. "How do you know I was saving him?" he inquired, pronouncing each word very slowly.

Raph snorted. "Because it's what you would do. Even though it was stupid. That guy had a _gun_, Leo. You know we can't fight a bullet. And you stepped in front of that guy anyway."

Raph almost flinched when Leo stood up and walked over to him. "And why would I do that?" Leo asked.

"I don't know." Raph shrugged. "Maybe the guy was being robbed. Maybe you stepped in without thinking to check out the scene a little more closely."

Leo very deliberately put his hands on Raph's shoulders, and Raph jumped as if a shock went through him. "_Why would I do that_?"

For a very long time, Raph said nothing. "I don't know," he realized. Leo would never do something without thinking it through.

"You know, Raph," Leo disagreed. "Think. What did you see?"

"Nothing!" Raph rubbed the dull throbbing in his forehead. "It was over by the time I got there."

"No, Raph. It wasn't. Think back."

Raph heaved a heavy breath and closed his eyes, forcing himself to pick out details of that night.

_The four were on a routine run through the city. They went in pairs, Raph with Mikey and Leo with Donny._

"Wrong," Leo said.

Without opening his eyes, Raph said, "What?" Even under the circumstances, it was odd having Leo argue with his silent thoughts.

"Try again."

Something twisted in Raph's stomach. Fear? That must have been it, because his hands were shaking.

_They went in pairs, Mikey with Donny and Leo with Raph_.

This time Leo said nothing.

_For a long time the run was uneventful, until Leo halted just before jumping to the next rooftop._

_Raph almost slammed right into him. "What did you do that for?" Raph demanded._

_"Shh," Leo whispered, and motioned for Raph to follow him to the edge of the roof. Wordlessly Raph obeyed, too curious to protest for now. When he followed Leo's gaze to the street below he found what looked to be a mugging taking place._

"Wrong," Leo interrupted again.

"I don't want to do this." Raph barely recognized his own voice, broken with misery.

"I'm sorry, Raph," Leo said again. "I need you to try. Please. For me."

_When he followed Leo's gaze to the street below he found a group of Purple Dragons surrounding an unmarked van that was parked under the broken street light._

_"All right," Raph said, grinning in anticipation. "Let's see what they're up to." He was ready to drop down to the gathering below, but Leo caught his arm._

_"We can see fine from here," Leo said._

_Raph stared at him. "Let me rephrase," Raph clarified. "Let's go down there and bust heads, since we know they're up to no good."_

_"We don't know anything, Raph."_

_"Oh, please," Raph muttered, shaking off Leo's arm. Before Leo could say anything else, Raph had already performed a graceful leap onto the hood of the van._

_None of the Purple Dragons saw him, too engrossed in whatever they were unloading from the vehicle. But most of them heard the loud banging that Raph didn't try to conceal when he landed on the now-dented metal._

_While the Dragons began to approach, quicker as each one saw the uninvited guest, Raph thought he heard Leo shout something to him. At first Raph tuned it out, like he usually did when Leo told him that he was doing something stupid, but then Leo's voice became so panicked that Raph tried to pick out his brother's voice above the angry shouting._

_"They're unloading guns!"_

_"Now he tells me," Raph muttered to himself. The closest Dragons were inches away at this point. The ones in the back of the mob, however, were beginning to arm themselves. Oh, how perfect was that?_

_Raph submerged himself into the group of unarmed dragons. He was sure that they wouldn't shoot into their own guys. Then he began the busting of heads. Once he took care of a few of them, Raph would back off. Just a few, way before the guns had a clear shot. It would be easy._

Raph's eyes flew open. Somehow he had ended up on his knees, with Leo kneeling nearby. "I..." Raph had no idea what he was trying to say. It didn't matter, though, because his voice could barely croak out that single syllable.

"Keep going," Leo coaxed.

Instead of closing his eyes again Raph got to his feet and walked to the edge of the roof. He looked down at the street, and allowed the images to violate his mind again for the first time since it had happened.

_He didn't count on Leo doing what he did. Everything would have been fine if Leo had stayed on that roof._

_Raph would have been dead, but still... it would have been better. His family couldn't lose Leo, too. They needed Leo._

_Apparently Raph hadn't seen that the driver was still in the van. He had been so focused on the throng of Dragons at the back of the van that he failed to even see that the driver hadn't gotten out yet._

_Raph knew now that the driver must have climbed back and grabbed a gun. Also, the windshield must not have been bullet proof, because the driver didn't even leave the van to fire the shot._

_Leo dropped out of the sky. Okay, Raph amended, Leo must have dropped from his perch on the building. In any case, Leo ended up right in front of Raphael, so close that Raph stumbled backwards. Then the windshield of the van shattered into a million pieces, and Leo fell to a crumpled heap at Raph's feet._

_With absolute certainty Raph knew that Leo was dead before he hit the ground. Still, as more guns fired in their direction, Raph dragged his brother's body away with him behind a dumpster nearby. He didn't even think to call Don or Mike. That didn't matter, though, because they arrived before the sirens began. All of New York must have heard the shooting. All Raph had to do was wait with Leo's body sprawled next to him until the Purple Dragons gave up, which they did quickly when they realized that making so much noise while transporting their cargo was probably a mistake._

_Mikey showed up first, but Donny blew past him when Mikey stopped with a shocked look on his face. Raph looked down at himself. He was sitting in a pool of blood. It took him a few seconds to realize that some of the blood was his own. A steady trail of blood was seeping out of a gash on his shoulder. A bullet must have grazed him. Leo wasn't bleeding so much anymore, not without the aid of a beating heart._

_Raph thought about telling Donny that, that Leo was already gone, but he was already burying this night deep into the darkest corner of his mind. And from the depths of his imagination he constructed a new story, one that left Raph out of it. One that wasn't his fault._

Raph touched the scar on his left shoulder. Now he knew why Donny and Mikey had been walking on eggshells around him. Why Leo had been leaking out of his subconscious, trying to bring him back to reality.

Not anymore. Leo was nowhere to be seen. All was quiet.

Raph took a deep breath. "I'm sorry," he said to the wind.

In response the breeze died down, warming the night air. Raph hung his head and turned away from the street. It was time to go home.

* * *

The three remaining mutants had fallen into a pattern during the past week. Donny cooked and cleaned everything, refusing Mikey's help. Mikey was painfully kind, offering no jokes or teasing. And Raph.... actually, Raph couldn't remember what his role had been. Until now he had been in his own world, making up lies about Leo's death and talking to his hallucinations.

The first one Raph saw when he walked in was Mikey, who was curled up on the couch in front of the television. When he saw Raph his mouth turned up into a small smile in greeting. Raph tried to smile back, but the muscles in his face couldn't quite remember how.

"Where's Donny?" Raph asked.

Something flashed in Mikey's eyes that Raph couldn't identify. Surprise? Relief?

"In the kitchen," Mikey replied, turning his eyes back to the television.

Raph hurried away before he could hear Mikey's sad voice again.

Donny was doing dishes from the dinner that Raph had apparently missed. Raph paused in the doorway, self-conscious at the realization that he had no idea if his brothers were angry with him.

Donny heard Raph approach, and turned. He looked tired. "Left you some dinner in the fridge," he said, returning to his work.

"Thanks."

Donny stopped what he was doing and faced Raph again. Some of the exhaustion on his face was replaced with the same look Mikey had given him. For a long time Donny gave Raph a puzzled stare, until he seemed to make a decision. "Welcome back," he said.

Raph wasn't entirely sure what that meant, but he didn't think that Donny was only referring to his short absence tonight.

"I'm sorry," Raph said. "... about what happened."

Donny shook his head. "We don't know what happened. You haven't said a word since..." he trailed off and glared at the floor.

Raph walked over to the kitchen table and sat, motioning for Donny to do the same. "Then I'd like to tell you a story."

* * *

**A/N: There you have it. That's the first time I ever killed off a turtle. Leo should be so honored. Or... really insulted. I dunno. But I hope you liked it. **


End file.
